Random sample elections

ABSTRACT

A method allows a random sample of a large population of voters to cast votes and for both the unpredictability/un-manipulability of the sample selection and the integrity of the tally to be verified by any interested parties using public information. The problem of vote selling is addressed. Also, a variant allows voters to remain substantially anonymous.

The present application is a Continuation-in-Part of U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 15/405,395 filed on Jan. 13, 2017, which is aContinuation-in-Part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/237,991filed on Feb. 10, 2014, which is a National Phase of PCT/US2012/000287filed on Jun. 18, 2012, which claims benefit of U.S. ProvisionalApplication No. 61/498,597 filed on Jun. 19, 2011. All of theseapplications are incorporated by reference in their entirety in thiscontinuation in part application.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The invention is in the general field of polling, and more specificallywhere not all eligible persons are per poll.

BACKGROUND ART

Commercial and social advantage may result from a technique whereby apopulation can be polled, whether or not binding, with a result that isbelieved more representative and/or convincing than what is achieved byelections today.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING FIGURES

FIG. 1 shows a combination flowchart and cryptographic protocol diagramof an exemplary embodiment of an overall voting system aspect inaccordance with the teachings the invention.

FIG. 2 shows a protocol diagram of an exemplary cryptographic commitmentsystem in accordance with the teachings of the invention.

FIG. 3 shows a detailed exemplary combination cryptographic protocol,functional, flow chart, and block diagram of a requesting voternon-count verification in accordance with the teachings of theinvention.

FIG. 4A-D show a detailed exemplary combination cryptographic protocol,functional, and block diagram of an exemplary voting system withintegrity that can be verified by any interested party in accordancewith the teachings of the invention.

FIG. 5 shows a detailed exemplary combination flow chart, cryptographicprotocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplary voting systemwith integrity that can be verified by any interested party inaccordance with the teachings of the invention.

FIG. 6 shows a detailed exemplary combination flow chart, cryptographicprotocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplary remote votingsystem with randomly selected voters and integrity that can be verifiedby any interested party in accordance with the teachings of theinvention.

FIG. 7A-D show a detailed exemplary combination cryptographic protocol,functional, and block diagram of an exemplary remote voting system withdecoy ballots and integrity that may be verified by any interested partyin accordance with the invention.

FIG. 8 shows a detailed exemplary combination flow chart, cryptographicprotocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplary remote votingsystem with randomly selected voters, decoy ballots, and integrity thatmay be verified by any interested party in accordance with the teachingsof the invention.

FIG. 9 shows a combination block and cryptographic protocol diagram ofsecure sample voting.

FIG. 10 shows a step block diagram of secure sample voting.

FIG. 11A shows a detailed combination block and schematic diagram of anexemplary multiparty election authority voting system, includingproviding of ballots, including optionally decoy ballots, to potentialvoters.

FIG. 11B relates to FIG. 11A and shows voting by voters and therevealing of results of a corresponding election.

FIG. 12 shows a detailed combination flowchart and block diagram of anexemplary multiparty election authority voting system.

BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

This section introduces some of the inventive concepts in a way thatwill readily be appreciated, but that may make significantsimplifications and omissions for clarity and should accordingly not betaken to limit their scope in any way; the next section presents moredetailed descriptions.

Random-sample election techniques can it is believed furtheradvantageously have a cost for a large population that may be severalorders of magnitude less than that of conducting a conventionalelection. The properties that are believed achievable in some examplerandom-sample elections may be summarized as follows:

-   -   Only votes from randomly selected voters are counted.    -   Integrity of the published tally of votes cast is        cryptographically proved.    -   Vote buying and other “improper influence” of voters is        difficult or even impractical.    -   Ballot secrecy violation requires collusion/compromise of        election authority or the underlying cryptography.    -   Voters can optionally be compensated for valid participation        (even based on a test to determine that they made consistent        answers to the questions).    -   Voters can optionally remain substantially anonymous from all        but the election authority.

A method for randomly sampling votes from a relatively large populationof persons comprising: committing publicly to information based on firstkey information that will determine selected persons from first publicrandom values, the first public random values to be realized later;committing publicly to information based on second key informationincluding for audit of ballot information and related tally informationresponsive to at least second public random values, the second publicrandom values to be realized later; providing ballot information, afterthe first public random values are realized, to the persons selected bythe first public random values realized; accepting and making publicvoted ballot information related to the ballot information provided atleast to the selected persons; making public a tabulation of the votedballot information; establishing, by revealing information related tothe second key information, that the tally corresponds at leastsubstantially with high probability to the voted ballot information; andrevealing the identity of selected persons after the vote information isaccepted and made public.

The method just described, further comprising: receiving participationrequests each related to a requesting person; providing ballotinformation to the requesting persons; accepting and making public votedballot information related to the participation requesting ballots;making public the tabulation that includes the votes related to ballotsselected but does not include any votes related to participationrequested ballots; and such that the information supplied to and thatmade public related to requesting persons is substantiallyunrecognizable as to whether it is related to requesting persons orrelated to selected persons.

Either of the two methods just described, further comprising revealingthe identity of requesting voters along with those of selected voters.Either of the three methods just described, further comprising makingthe identity of the voters revealed public. Any of the methods justdescribed, apart from the previous one just described, furthercomprising only revealing the identity of the voter to a verifier personalso selected at random and making the identity of the verifier personpublic at least after the votes are cast.

GENERAL DESCRIPTION

A general description of an exemplary embodiment will be provided aswill be appreciated without limitation and making certainsimplifications for clarity as will be understood.

A pre-agreed public random process, such as stock-market closing data,determines which voters are to receive ballots that will be counted.Although the voters are publicly verifiable as selected by the resultsof the random process, their identity is hidden at least initially.Those ballots sent to the randomly selected voters will be known tothose voters to be at least very likely counted, as a consequence of apublic cryptographic proof. Anyone can, however, request a ballot thatwill not be counted. Because such requested ballots will only bedistinguishable by the requesting voter, they can be sold to vote buyersand are believed more likely to be sold than the countable ballots.

The identity of all voters may be made public once voting is over.Alternatively, a number of “verifiers” may be selected at random,provided with instructions, and only later would the identity ofverifiers be made public. Each verifier is provided the identity of adifferent one of the voters and instructed to contact that voter andensure that the voter has in fact cast the ballot—and to raise an alarmotherwise. Voters may obtain a code, also known but only in random partsto the verifier, so that the verifier can be convinced that the voterdid in fact receive a ballot and verifiers can provide evidence ofsuccessful verification they performed. Verifiers may be employed forcounted and even uncounted voters. Verifiers, as well as optionallyvoters who answer verifier queries, may collect rewards. Of course ifballots are sent “signature required,” then the authority has somerecourse against a voter falsely crying foul.

The participants in a simplified example are the Election Authority and

Three classes of members of the public:

-   -   (1) randomly-selected voters whose votes will be counted;    -   (2) self-selected voters whose votes will not be counted; and    -   (3) optionally, randomly selected verifiers who do not vote but        rather check that a corresponding voter did participate.

Another embodiment of the invention includes a computerizedcryptographic method for at least one election authority to conduct anelection where at least some voters vote remotely and the integrity ofthe corresponding tally can substantially be verified by any interestedparty. The method includes the at least one election authority providingballots to voters with the ballots including vote-codes, receiving fromat least one voter at least one of the vote-codes, such that theselection of at least which voters receive which or any ballots beingsubstantially difficult for the election authority to manipulate; andsuch that at least from some observers at least something is hiddenabout which voters receive which ballots or which vote codes.

The voting method can also include the step of at least one electionauthority issuing at least one decoy ballot; and the decoy ballots beingprovided by a method selected from the group consisting of:unpredictable, responsive to requests, an auction, and algorithmicallyresponsive at least to information about voters, and the at least onedecoy ballot not contributing a vote in the tally.

Further in the voting method, at least one of the at least one voterthat a decoy ballot is issued to being supplied a substantial proof thatthe ballot is a decoy.

In the method above, providing of ballots can include includingphysically combining ballots with hidden vote codes within envelopesthat are addressed with temporarily hidden addresses, and/or theproviding of ballots including a multiparty mixing of recipients of thevote codes.

The providing of ballots can include a multiparty transformation of thevote codes as well as including a mixing of decoy ballots along withreal ballots.

The inventive method can also include the step of delivering to votersreceiving decoy ballots by deniable encryption an indication of whetherthe ballot is a decoy.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

Detailed descriptions are presented here of various sufficient to allowthose of skill in the art to use the exemplary preferred embodiments ofthe inventive concepts.

Turning now to FIG. 1, a detailed combination cryptographic protocol,functional, flowchart and block diagram of an overall exemplaryrandom-sample voting process will be provided. A random-sample electioncan be conducted in nine steps as indicated in FIG. 1 by the stepnumbers and as will also be further described with reference to FIG. 2.

Referring now to step 10, commitments are posted by the electionadministrator defining: (a) the countable ballots, (b) the uncountedballots, and (c) combined tabulation tables for both types of ballots.

More particularly, encrypted values sometimes called “commitments” aremade public, such as by posting online, for instance, replicated and/orin a digitally signed form.

Each countable and uncountable ballot entry, shown arrayed vertically,consists in the example of a pair made up of two components. The firstcomponent is of the same type, whereas the second component differs forthe countable and uncountable ballots. The first component, in theexample, is a so-called mix input item sometimes referred to as an“onion.” It is a nested or iterated layering of public key encryption,as is known, with what will be called the “payload” at its innermostcore being the ballot indicia from the combined tabulation tables to bedescribed. The second component, continuing the example, is for theuncountable ballots, supplied in step 11 to be described, and for thecountable ballots, as described in step 12.

Some combined tabulation table columns include commitments and othercolumns are empty and will be filled later. The tables relate to whathas been called a “voter verifiable” or sometimes “end-to-end” electionsystem, such as those previously disclosed by the present applicantunder the rubric “Punchscan” or “Scantegrity,” such as have been used inbinding elections. The example chosen for clarity is like that ofPunchscan as used by Scantegrity, where there are three tables, shownleft to right, as will be understood and familiar: (a) serial numbers,“indicia” to be printed on ballot, and the corresponding “vote codes”;(b) a pointer to the ballot row, the group operation relating the ballotrow entry to the intermediate position entry, a second group operationrelating the intermediate position to the row pointer for the resultsrow; and (c) the results column. The rows of the second and third tablesare independently randomly permuted. Initially the vote codes, ballotrow and results row pointer, and results columns are empty; the othercolumns are filled with commits.

One example way, described here for clarity but without limitation, tokeep the ballots submitted by volunteers from having their votesincluded in the tally is for the corresponding “results row” entriesalready described to be pre-filled for these ballots with an indicationthat the vote will not be counted.

Referring to step 11, volunteers submit multiply-encrypted values with aso-called “payload” or here “seed” that will result in their own addressbeing selected.

More particularly, each volunteer allowed may provide a mix input, muchas already described for the first components, but with a payload thatis an “encrypted” index into the list of voter addresses, to bedescribed further with reference to steps 15 and 18.

Referring to step 12, “Public random” values are created in a pre-agreedmanner, such as a cryptographic hash of certain stock market closingdata, that should be unpredictable earlier than the completion of steps10 and 11.

More particularly, such public random values are known and used, forinstance, in lotteries and in voter-verifiable election systems moregenerally. Prior to a certain time, it is believed infeasible to predictthe values or even some functions of the values.

Referring to step 13, the random values from step 12 are used: (a) toselect which committed values from step 11 are to be opened; and (b) asrandom seeds for cryptographically-generated voter identity indexes. Therandom seeds are processed as the constructed second components are,with the result believed hard to predict. When a random value isprocessed through a mix that performs operations that would result insuccessive layers of encryption being stripped off (had they beenapplied in the first place), as will be understood by one of skill inthe cryptographic protocol art, what results is a number (from the samerange as can be generated from a user-constructed mix input), which canmap nearly uniformly to a user identity or address. Typically, theresults at each stage of processing through the mix are “restricted,”such as by truncation of enough bits, so that reverse-engineering themapping from input to output becomes computationally infeasible.

More particularly, by processing the random seeds as if they wereonions, by what may in effect be in some examples application of one ormore digital signatures, the resulting value is hard to predict by thosewithout the signing keys. This will also be further described withreference to step 14.

Also, in the present example, some such values are used to determinewhich of the committed values from step 10 already described are to bedecrypted in a publicly verifiable manner, referred to here as “opened,”This is a known use and the example includes a random selection of pairsand the rows of the voter-verifiable election tables that match thepairs in ballot indicia, as already mentioned as included in the pairsof the first table. Such opening of randomly selected rows in the tablesis known to provide a kind of audit of whether the table content iscorrectly formed, as will be understood.

Referring to step 14, a verifiable mix cascade is conducted,establishing that the batch of input pairs consisting of both types(random voter identities and submitted voter identities) aresuccessively decrypted and mixed to produce an output batch of encryptedindices into the voter address list.

More particularly, the mix in the example is shown as what was called a“cascade” when the notion of mixing was first disclosed, in “Untraceableelectronic mail, return addresses, and digital pseudonyms,”Communications of the ACM, Volume 24, Issue 2, February 1981, by thepresent applicant. Verifiability may be obtained by various interactiveor non-interactive cryptographic proof techniques, as are known in anextensive literature tracing back, for instance, to early resultspresented by Sako and Kilian in “Receipt-free mix-type voting scheme,”Advances in Cryptology—EUROCRYPT '95, Springer-Verlag, 1995. Parallelapplication of a protocol, in what has been called “coordinatedinstances,” allows the components of a pair to be treated in the same orin a different manner, but for the association of the components to bemaintained, as will be understood.

It will however be noted that in the present example system twodifferent types of second-component items are mixed: random values andprepared mix input items. Processing of the latter yields the knowndecryption. Processing of the former, however, may be regarded as thenested or iterated application of digital signatures. The result isbelieved mainly unpredictable without the signing keys. In the presentexample, the final signing is not applied or a committed key is notrevealed that compresses the values to the range of valid indices to thevoter address list, as will also be further described with reference tostep 18.

Referring to step 15, the encrypted ballot values are decrypted from themix output batch and printed and mailed to the corresponding voteraddress found by indexing the table of voter addresses.

More particularly, the final second components of the final mix batchare used, as has been mentioned already with reference to step 14, toselect respective voter addresses from the list of such addresses shown,as mentioned as will be further described with reference to step 18. Thepaired vote ballot indicia, also not revealed in cleartext, is alsodecrypted. Thus, pairs of ballot indicia and voter address aredetermined by the devices/system called out as “decrypt and print” inthe figure. The result is printed material, in the example, including aballot with the indicia, not visible from the outside, and the addressvisible from the outside. This may be accomplished by conventionalmeans, such as printing a ballot form and stuffing it in an envelopewith the delivery address applied to it. These addressed items aredelivered to voters, for instance, such as by being mailed or courieredwith or without tracking or signature required.

Referring to step 16, voters cast ballots for instance online using themail they receive, which results in coded votes on an electronicbulletin board.

More particularly, the voter provides the codes through a web browser orother software application. It is also believed desirable that the voterchecks that the codes are properly posted. The so-called electronic“bulletin board” system is well-known for such public and verifiableposting, as evidenced by the extensive literature on the subject.Various improvements to these techniques by the present applicant aredisclosed in co-pending applications.

Referring to step 17, the tally is posted and proven to correspond tothe published data and coded votes on the bulletin board. Votes foruncounted ballots will not yield votes, but may be stopped from beingcounted, such as by the pre-filled results rows entries mentionedalready.

More particularly, various voter-verifiable techniques are known;however, the particular example tables shown will be described forclarity. First the results and intermediate position columns arepopulated (they were initially empty as mentioned earlier). Then a laterpublic random value, such as described with reference to step 12, butwhere the unpredictability begins after the population mentioned, may beused. The random values determine which of the ballot row and resultsrow pointer is to be revealed for each respective row, in some exampleaudit schemes. Other audit schemes being well known in the cryptographicelection integrity art.

Referring to step 18, the encrypted indices posted in step 14 aredecrypted without regard for whether their votes would be counted ornot.

More particularly, at a stage that is believed desirable later than thebulletin-board is populated or after the verifiability of the election,the encryption of the voter address may be revealed in some examples forauditing. Other types of auditing, not requiring the voter identities tobe made public, will also be further described later.

Turning now to FIG. 2, a flowchart in accordance with the teachings ofthe present invention will be described in detail. Each of the ninesteps already described with reference to FIG. 1 are summarized in theflowchart. The protocol described is somewhat more generic than the veryconcrete protocol description presented with reference to FIG. 1, aswill be appreciated, was for clarity. In particular, for instance, thebox for step 20 indicates only some form of commitment being made by theElection Authority, which may be comprised of oneorganization/individual and/or a quorum of organizations/individuals ora more complex structuring of participants, as are known in somecryptographic protocol settings.

As another example, the box for step 21 calls out voter identificationand not address, as other procedures for voters to obtain ballots areanticipated, such as, without limitation, by in person visit or onlineor various combinations of techniques.

Boxes for steps 22 and 23 correspond to the steps described but in lessdetailed and more generic language.

The box for step (4) as yet another example calls for a verifiable“mixing,” being more generally whatever cryptographic protocol, nomatter how it works, accomplishing the result so hiding the input andoutput correspondence.

The box of step 25, as still another example, calls out the “supply” ofballots, more generally, rather than the particular steps of printingand mailing ballot forms.

The box of step 26, as yet still another example, calls for votersposting votes with authentication, more generally than using codedvotes.

The box of step 27, as yet again another example, calls for a genericcryptographic election verification process of whatever type.

And finally, the box of step 28, as still again another example, refersto voter identity information more generally as contrasted with the morespecific voter addresses.

Turning now to FIG. 3, a detailed exemplary combination cryptographicprotocol, functional, flow chart, and block diagram of a requestingvoter non-count verification is provided in accordance with theteachings of the invention. A party who requests a ballot, it isbelieved, may advantageously verify that votes cast using a particularballot will not be included in the tally of the election. Box 39 showssuch a verification step and/or cryptographic process; boxes 30 through38 are essentially the same as boxes 20 through 28, as already describedwith reference to FIG. 2 and will not be described again here forclarity.

It will be appreciated that the requesting voter in the protocol alreadydescribed has submitted the mix input or onion that will be peeled toreveal the voter address, as already described. It will now also beunderstood that if those performing the mixing, already described withreference to step 14 of FIG. 1, were to publish the intermediate outputsof the mixing rounds (such publishing being known and two such roundsbeing shown in the example), then the secrecy of the mix permutation(s)would not be compromised; however, the requesting voter would,accordingly, be able to check in at least some exemplary mixingembodiments that the onion supplied was in fact included in the inputand even that it was properly decrypted in stages and resulted in theoutput including the address. Thus, the requesting voter can verify thatthe ballot corresponds to a row in the tables 10 shown.

In order to allow the requesting voter to ensure that the ballotreceived pursuant to the request will not be counted in the tally, theelection authority can further open the rows in the tables 10 thatcorrespond to the ballot. Such opening is preferably what may here becalled a “private opening,” an opening available only to thecorresponding requesting voter. An example way to create such a privateopening would be for the election authority to encrypt the data thatwould be revealed by the opening and supply the data to the requestingvoter in encrypted form. In one example, such encryption could be by akey secret to the requesting voter and the election authority; inanother example, for instance, the encryption by the election authoritycould be using a public key for which the requesting voter knows thecorresponding private key.

Corresponding to current election practice, in some exemplaryembodiments, the randomly-selected voters can include essentially allvoters, as will readily be understood. Choosing all among all is atrivial or boundary or special case of a random selection of a propersubset, as will readily be appreciated. In such a setting, for clarity,the randomly-selected voters may here be called “regular voters” forclarity.

The requesting voters, who are believed typically in such examples to beperforming the role of regular voters as well, will accordingly receivetwo ballots: one ballot whose votes should be counted and one ballotwhose votes should not be counted. The ballots are identified by theirserial numbers, for instance, as already explained and shown withreference to step 10 of FIG. 1. Accordingly, the voter will be able todistinguish between the two ballots. Thus, in the role of requestingvoter, the requested ballot is received and recognized as such and canbe sold to a vote buyer with significant confidence that both a votecast with it will not be counted and that the fact that it was arequested ballot will not be revealed to the vote buyer, ideally evenafter the election.

In some examples, some or all of the regular voters (that can obviouslyalso here be called “unrequesting” voters who receive “unrequested”ballots) may not be requesting voters. It will be understood that suchan assignment of voters to roles could, in some examples and settings,it is believed, help a vote buyer to distinguish whether a ballot beingoffered for sale is an unrequested ballot or a requested ballot.Nevertheless, the inventive aspects already described here are believedto still provide protection apart from this aspect. One example way toaddress such potential distinguishability, however, would be to hide theidentities of one or both class of voter, by whatever means, as will beappreciated.

Turning now to FIG. 4A-D, a detailed exemplary combination cryptographicprotocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplary voting systemwith integrity that can be verified by any interested party inaccordance with the teachings of the invention is shown. FIGS. 4A showstwo example ballots; 4B is the initial commitments; 4C the bulletinboard data; and 4D the partially opened commitments after the election.

Referring more specifically now to FIG. 4A, two example printed paperwhat may here be called “double ballots” are shown in plan view. Eachdouble ballot includes indicia for an optional title, some optionalinstructions, and two individual ballot parts. The double ballots haveserial numbers “100” and “101” while what may here be called the“single” or “individual” ballots that make up double ballot 100, forinstance, have serial numbers “100a” and “100b,” as will be seen. Eachindividual ballot has two columns of values; in the example with asingle binary question, each column contains two values, though withmore options it is believed that there can be correspondingly more rows,as will readily be understood. The left column of values are what may becalled “vote codes” and the right column the “choices” or “votes”available to voters. (It will be appreciated that in some examples thechoices are also randomly ordered.)

For instance, the double ballot with serial #“100” contains two votecodes for the voter choice “yes,” “9343” and “1134.” Single ballot“101a” has vote code 2843 for voter choice “yes.” Each voter in thisexample receives a double ballot and, according to the exampleinstructions, is to choose one of the two individual ballots to vote andsupply the electronic bulletin board, as already described, with thevote code that corresponds to the voter choice. For instance, a voterreceiving double ballot 101 and wishing to vote “no” may either: (a)select individual ballot 101 a and then supply code “6533” to theelectronic bulletin board; or (b) select individual ballot 101 b andthen supply code “8282” to the electronic bulletin board. The ballotsare supplied voters before the voting, at least before it closes.

Referring to FIG. 4B, an example instance is shown of a table of valuescommitted to, for instance by the election authority already mentioned.The dotted lines indicate that the values below them are not public butare posted in at least a kind of encrypted form, already described here,called a commitment. The example corresponds to the two example ballotsjust described with reference to FIG. 4A. Each “row” of the tablecorresponds to a triple: the serial number of the individual ballot, thevote code, and the vote. For instance, a row for individual ballot“101a” contains this serial number as its first column entry, vote code“2843” as its middle entry, and the vote of “yes” in its third column.The commitment is made before the voting, at least before it opens.

The same values printed on the ballots are to be used in the table;these values would ideally at least include unpredictable vote codes.Other aspects may, it is believed, be chosen at random or with certainrelationships and/or distributions. In whatever way the values arechosen, they would be copied into the corresponding portions of thetable and ballots. But, as will be understood, the rows of the table canbe thought of as randomly permuted and/or the row assignments asrandomly selected; the ballots in some examples can be printed or usedin a fixed or randomized order.

Referring to FIG. 4C, the electronic bulletin board state is shown withexample values that would be present once the two example ballotsalready described with reference to FIG. 4A, and with data correspondingto that described with reference to FIG. 48, are voted. The electronicbulletin board has already been described and in some examples may alsobe described as a provision on computer network servers allowing votersto make values pubic in a way that ideally cannot readily be altered. Inparticular, the voter who received double-ballot “100” has apparentlychosen individual ballot “100a” to vote and has chosen to vote “yes” byproviding the vote code “9343” to the electronic bulletin board.Similarly, as will be understood, the voter who received double-ballot“101” has apparently chosen individual ballot “100b” to vote and haschosen to vote “no” by providing the vote code “8282” to the electronicbulletin board.

Referring finally to FIG. 4D, an example instance of a table of valuescommitted to as described with reference to FIG. 4B is shown, but nowwith some of the values opened as indicated for those values missing thesurrounding dotted rectangle. In an example rule and with the exampleballots, votes and values already described, the two vote codes thatwere voted each correspond to a row that remains committed except thatits votes are shown. Thus, the tally is readily seen/computed based onthese two rows uniquely identified by the patterns of the first twocolumn commitment not being opened. The other data shown still committedis the votes of the other rows of the corresponding individual ballotsvoted; the so-called “vote” values are shown still committed to. This,it is believed helps protect so-called “ballot secrecy,” that is, howthe voter voted. Ballots that are not voted, for whatever reason, can beopened fully.

A variation, as will be appreciated, reveals the voted codes but hidesthe vote for them and reveals the votes for the unvoted codes;accordingly, the votes are flipped for purposes of tally.

Turning now to FIG. 5, a detailed exemplary combination flow chart,cryptographic protocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplaryvoting system with integrity that can be verified by any interestedparty in accordance with the teachings of the invention is shown. Theprocess described was also illustrated by FIG. 4A-D and thecorresponding description.

Box 51 shows the creation of a ballot pair information per serialnumber, each with distinct vote codes per choice, as will be understood.The vote codes are believed at least different for different voterchoices within the individual ballot serial number; however, it may beadvantageous in some settings to keep the vote codes distinct over alarger range of occurrences, such as even over a complete election orrelated elections.

Box 52 shows the printing of the ballot pairs. These are as shown inFIG. 4 in the example two individual ballots, with the same serialnumber, attached such as by perforation.

Box 53 is the encryption of each element of <serial #, vote code, vote>separately and the posting of each triple in a random row. This hasalready been described with reference to FIG. 4B, as will be understood.The terminology of “encryption and posting” will be appreciated as analternate way to describe the “commitment” process as already mentioned;what may be called “decryption” can then be considered similar to“opening” as also already mentioned.

Box 54 indicates that voters are each given a printed ballot pair. Itwill be understood that if the election authority, “EA,” were to learnthe correspondence between serial numbers and voters, then the EA couldlink votes to voters. Accordingly, ideally ballots are provided in arandomized order. For attendance voting, ballots are randomly selectedby voters from a stack or hopper or the like. For remote voting, paperor electronic ballots may be mailed or otherwise delivered to voters;the linking of the particular instances corresponding to particularvoters is preferably kept from the EA. In a practical example, a stackof ballots that have already been folded or covered with scratch off isshuffled repeatedly before being stuff into envelopes for mailing.

Box 55 depicts one ballot being accepted from each voter. If at apolling place unmarked ballots could be accepted into a ballot box, amalfeasant EA could claim that a ballot was not voted when in fact thevoter had marked it. One example way to prevent this kind of potentialvote cancelling in attendance voting, or the unfounded allegation thatit had occurred, would be for the ballot box to be “guarded” by means,human and/or automated, that prevents or at least detects unmarkedballots from being inserted. For instance, the ballots could be foldedso that an unmarked position us visible but what vote the correspond tois hidden. In some other examples, the vote codes are protected byscratch-off coating to be removed by the voter, as has been mentionedwith reference to FIG. 4A, and the ballot identity is protected by beingplaced in an envelope that contains a window that exposes theun-scratched vote code.

Box 56 is the opening, in case there are unvoted ballots, of allencryptions related to such ballots. It will be understood that by soopening these ballots they are cancelled from the tables and so ballotsthat remain in the table can, in some examples, be considered ideallyone per voter. (hi some further examples to be described, such as withreference to FIG. 7 and FIG. 8, there may be ballots that are known tobe so-called requested or that may be called “decoy” ballots, and theinitial total number of ballots in the commitment table can be the sumof the decoy ballots and the regular ballots) Once polls close, anyunvoted ballots are believed preferably removed from consideration bybeing fully opened, as already mentioned.

Finally, now, box 57 is processing for ballots voted. For each rowvoted, the vote element of the triple is opened; if the row is unvoted,both the serial and vote code elements are opened. At this point thetally can be computed by adding the opened votes. Also, anyone should,ideally, be able to verify that the codes voted, as seen on theelectronic bulletin board described with reference to FIG. 4, are notshown; if they are opened, an error or malfeasance is believed to beindicated and in some examples the corresponding voter might request thevoted individual ballot be shown. In some optional example embodiments,the vote codes are only revealed in part during a first period to allowvoters to register complaints; a complaint would include the remainderof the vote code, as it should be known to the voter. During thecorresponding second period, the remaining portions of the vote codesare revealed; if there is a match with a complaint, malfeasance isbelieved indicated, at least with some probability.

Turning now to FIG. 6, a detailed exemplary combination flow chart,cryptographic protocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplaryremote voting system with randomly selected voters and integrity thatcan be verified by any interested party is shown in accordance with theteachings of the invention. The process described was also illustratedby FIG. 4A-D and the corresponding description.

Box 61 is the creation of a ballot pair per serial number, each withdistinct vote codes per choice, much as already described with referenceto FIG. 5 box 51.

Box 62 is the ballot printing much as already described with referenceto FIG. 5 box 52, or the equivalent forming of the correspondingelectronic image.

Box 63 is the commitment to each element of <serial, vote code, vote>separately, much as already described with reference to box FIG. 5 box53.

Box 64 is the sending of ballots to voters, such as physically by mailor electronically, such as by email. In this embodiment, ballots can bein some examples be sent a randomly selected subset of voters. Forinstance, a batch of ballots may be paired each with a mailing labelchosen randomly from a large collection of such labels.

Box 65 is the accepting of one ballot from each of the randomly selectedvoters (e.g., online with serial number and code posted on bulletinboard).

Box 66, like box 56 already described with reference to FIG. 5, is theopening of all the encryptions of any ballot not voted.

Box 67, like box 56 already described with reference to FIG. 5, is theopening related to voted ballots: if row voted, open vote only; if rowunvoted, open serial and vote code.

Turning now to FIG. 7A-D, a detailed exemplary combination cryptographicprotocol, functional, and block diagram of an exemplary remote votingsystem with decoy ballots and integrity that may be verified by anyinterested party is shown in accordance with the teachings of theinvention. The figure is organized much as with FIG. 4: FIGS. 7A showstwo example ballots; 7B is the initial commitments; 7C the bulletinboard data; and 4D the partially opened commitments after the election.As will be appreciated, and for clarity, the description alreadyprovided with reference to FIG. 4 will be relied on and what arebelieved example difference between this and the setting of FIG. 4 willbe highlighted described in detail here.

Referring now more particularly to FIG. 7A, two ballots are shown. Theyare the same as of FIG. 4A, for clarity and simplicity, but one of themwill not be counted in the tally because it is what will be called herea “decoy” ballot, which is essentially what has been called elsewherehere a requested ballot. The ballot is believed “indistinguishable” fromwhat may here be called a “countable” ballot; put differently, the twolook the same but the table has encoded ballot “101” as a decoy, as willbe described more fully below.

Referring to FIG. 7B, the committed table is essentially the same asthat already described with reference to FIG. 4B, apart from theinclusion here of a new column, labeled “countable/dummy.” The entriesin this new column are the letter codes “C” for countable and “D” fordummy. As can be seen, ballot “100” has been marked countable and ballot“101” dummy, in each of their rows.

Referring to FIG. 7C, the electronic bulletin board has the same endstate as already described with reference to FIG. 4C, again as will beappreciated for simplicity and clarity.

Referring to FIG. 7D, there is an additional column compared to FIG. 4D,just as with FIG. 7B, compared to FIG. 4B. It will be seen that there isa further column on the right for the respective countable/dummyindicators. Furthermore, it will be appreciated that the only rows forwhich these indicators are opened correspond to the two codes voted.Thus, voted “yes” voted from ballots “100a” with code “9343” is counted,as indicated by the “C”; but, the “no” voted from ballots “101b” withcode “8282” is a dummy and not counted in the tally total, as indicatedby the “c.” Which of the double ballots, “100” or “101,” was the dummy,however, remains hidden.

Turning now, finally, to FIG. 8, a detailed exemplary combination flowchart, cryptographic protocol, functional, and block diagram of anexemplary remote voting system with randomly selected voters, decoyballots, and integrity that may be verified by any interested party inaccordance with the teachings of the invention is shown. The processdescribed was also illustrated by FIG. 7A-D and the correspondingdescription; it is also similar to that already described, such as withreference to the process of FIG. 6, with some differences. As will beappreciated, again, the description will highlight the differences ofthis embodiment with those already described, for clarity.

Box 81 is again the creation of a ballot pair per serial number, eachwith distinct vote codes per choice; most it is believed can be expectedto be marked countable, some marked dummy.

Box 82 is the printing of ballot pairs, or the electronic equivalent ofrendering them, without countable/dummy indication.

Box 83 is the formation of the commitment table. This entails encryptingeach element of <serial, vote code, vote, countable/dummy> separatelyand posts each quadruple in a random row.

Box 84 is the sending of ballots to each regular voter and fulfillingaccepted dummy ballot requests by providing a corresponding dummy ballotto each.

Box 85 shows that ballots voted online result in serial number and codeposted on bulletin board.

Box 86 is the opening of serial, vote code, and vote encryptions ofballots not voted. It will be appreciated that such opening is forreasons and has advantages already described; however, opening thecounted/dummy tag is not believed advantageous as it is believed that avote buyer for instance might opt to not to vote it or have it voted andthen learn if the seller were supplying a decoy.

Box 87, finally, is the opening of commitments. As already describedwith reference to FIG. 7D: if the row was voted, open vote andcountable/dummy; if the row was unvoted, open serial and vote code.

While these descriptions of the present invention have been given asexamples, it will be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the artthat various modifications, alternate configurations and equivalents maybe employed without departing from the spirit and scope of the presentinvention.

All manner of variations, generalizations and extensions areanticipated. As just one example, each verifier is provided with a voteridentity and each voter optionally with a confirmation code. Theverifier contacts the voter and obtains the confirmation code. A randomselection of the digits of the confirmation code are provided to theverifier along with the voter identity, so that the verifier can checkthe validity of the confirmation code and the voter cannot, at leastwith significant probably of detection, cheat the verifier. Theverifiers may be selected by a third portion of the input batch asdescribed, with random identities, and be paired with voter identities.The confirmation codes and random selections of digits may, forinstance, be constructed by the election authority. As another example,a multiparty protocol may be employed, instead of using a singleelection authority, as has been mentioned and will be understood.

Another embodiment of the invention is shown in FIGS. 9-12. Turning nowto FIG. 9, a combination block and cryptographic protocol diagram ofsecure sample voting is shown in accordance with the teachings of thepresent invention. Also indicated in the description are the numbers forthe steps of FIG. 10, to be described further later.

(Step 1110) The EA (“Election Authority”) commits to: a “voter roster”1020 (plaintext or row encrypted); one summand 1030 per ballot 1010 (oraddress label) to be printed, row-encrypted; and, e.g., fifty pairs oftwo rows 1060 and 1080 per ballot, row-encrypted. Before encryption,each of the pairs 1060 and 1080 has been randomly permuted, with thesame permutation applied to both lists of the same pair, but a differentrandom permutation applied to each pair. Each of the two rows per ballotcorresponds to a vote code and its associated vote, which for someballots can be “decoy” for both votes. Each encryption uses a differentkey, with any so-called “cryptographic commitment” scheme believedsuitable for use.

(Step 1120) The public summands 1040 are determined by apublicly-verifiable draw, such as a specific future blockchain hash.There is, in the example, one public summand per address to be printed.The index of the address to be printed is determined by the EA addingthe two summands 1060 and 1080, component-wise. Each resulting sum isreduced modulo the total number of voters on the roster 1020, 10,000voters in the example for clarity, thereby believed to determine a voteraddress on the roster unpredictably and uniformly at random. If theroster were encrypted, its corresponding row would be decrypted whenboth summands are revealed in audit.

(Step 1130) The EA prints the addresses on the envelopes 1090, and thenhides this printing, such as with opaque tape 1091. The EA also prints anumber of ballots 1010, equal the number of envelopes 1090, each hiddensuch as by scratch-off 1095. Some of these ballots optionally are decoyand the EA segregates any decoys and in the example keeps them in orderof printing.

(Step 1140) A public “ceremony” is conducted to which the EA providesthe envelopes and the non-segregated ballots, each in a separate sealedoversized-container, such as for instance a cardboard box sealed withtamper-indicating tape (not shown for clarity). The participants at theceremony, so as to verifiably thoroughly-mix the contents, physicallytumble the containers. Then they open the containers and stuff theenvelopes 1090 with the ballots 1010. The envelopes remaining arestuffed by the EA with the segregated ballots, but the EA is allowed toprivately peek at the addresses while stuffing the envelopes (resultingin the EA knowing the address on the envelope corresponding to eachdecoy ballot, so that it can send the proofs of decoy to the correctaddresses).

The participants at the ceremony can pick a number of the stuffedenvelopes and ballots to be audited at the ceremony. The physical hidinglayers 1091 and 1095 are removed, revealing the addresses and the ballotprinting, and these audited ballots become un-votable. The EA posts allthe row keys used to encrypt each audited address and ballot (allowinganyone to check that the decryptions match what was shown publicly atthe ceremony).

Additional audit can it is believed be provided by allowing someauditors to peek at some addresses (under the hiding layer 1091) beforethe envelope and its contained ballot are verifiably shredded, both forreal and for decoy ballots. Such a “peek” auditor of a real ballot cancheck to see if the addressee was contacted with knowledge that he/shewas a voter, which it is believed should never happen if the EA ishonest and does not leak information; a decoy ballot peek auditor cancheck that the addressee was in fact provided by the EA with a validwhat may here be called a “proof of decoy.” A simple such proof is therow positions of the respective ballot in all tables. The participantsthen stuff the ballots. The stuffed ballots have their address-hiding1091 removed before being mailed. This can best be done blind, such asin a glove box that is then emptied directly into postal collectionboxes.

(Step 1150) Voters, following the instructions printed on the ballots,each provide a ballot serial number and vote code online. (A knownexample way to accomplish this is by the ballot numbers and vote codesbeing chosen from a large enough space of at least roughlyequally-likely values that the online servers receiving the codes canhave only enough information to verify that the codes are in a validsubspace with high probability with only a negligible probability ofbeing able to successfully counterfeit ballots and essentially no way tolearn which votes are cast.)

(Step 1160) After close of polls, the EA reveals the second columns 1070by posting one for each of the already published column pairs 1060 and1080. These second columns 1070 are to include the votedindication—whether voted, decoy, or audited. These should be permutedexactly as the corresponding already-published pair 1070.

(Step 1170) A random draw of, for example, fifty bits is used. Ideallyit believed best to have at least roughly equal number of ones andzeroes (e.g., by draw without replacement until twenty five positionsare determined). It is believed it should be unpredictable until thelast commitments are posted.

(Step 1180) Each bit of the second draw indicates, for the respectivecopy of the columns: “0” indicates that the first column 1060 should befully decrypted, “1” indicates that the third column 1080 should befully decrypted.

Turning now to FIG. 10, a combination block diagram of secure samplevoting is shown in accordance with the teachings of the presentinvention. The eight steps described here were also referred to in thedescription of the previous FIG. 9.

Referring to step 1110, what is called out is “EA commits to voterroster, summand list per ballot, and multiple planes of tworow-encrypted permuted columns, two per ballot.”

Referring to step 1120, what is called out is “Draw determines publicsummands and these, combined with committed summands, determine indexinto roster of the voters to be sampled.”

Referring to step 1130, what is called out is “EA prints addresses onenvelopes and vote-codes on ballots; each hidden by an attached layer;decoy ballots are kept segregated.”

Referring to step 1140, what is called out is “Envelopes and/or realballots are mixed and then publicly stuffed; the decoy ballots arestuffed but the EA knows which ones are sent which voters; a publicaudit of some envelopes/ballots is conducted and the correspondingcommitments opened; optionally, some ballots are peeked at by auditorsand then destroyed.”

Referring to step 1150, what is called out is “Vote codes are collectedfrom voters; the received codes are optionally confirmed by verifying acheck property of valid codes.”

Referring to step 1160, what is called out is “EA reveals a column foreach plane, permuted as the two committed columns of that plane,including at least voted and not voted indications.”

Referring to step 1170, what is called out is “Draw determines somenumber of random bits, ideally with roughly equal number of ones andzeros.”

Referring to step 1180, what is called out is “For 1 bit, open firstcolumn of respective plane; for 0 bit, open third column of respectiveplane; tally is exposed redundantly by each plane.”

An example use scenario will now be described informally andspecifically for clarity, as will be appreciated, without any limitationwhatsoever. For concreteness, the EA will be referred to as “Joe.”

To get started running an election, Joe obtains the open sourcesoftware, installs it, and runs it. He enters the “ballot question” hewants voted on and three date/times: opening of polls, closing of polls,and start of a “ceremony” for auditing and mailing the ballots. Thesoftware then uploads a hash value to a blockchain (step 1110 and 1120).

Joe also is believed to require some physical supplies. He purchases1,000 each: envelopes, printer labels (e.g., Avery 5163), stamps,stick-on scratch-off circles, and unprinted 3″×5″ cards. He additionallyneeds to obtain some black masking tape, some tamper-indicating tape,and a couple of large cardboard boxes.

The software, with a small delay after publishing to the blockchain,renders ballots and address labels, which Joe prints (step 1130) usingthe supplies. He sticks the labels and stamps on the envelopes andcovers each address with a piece of black tape, (taking care to onlyplace tape on the label, not the envelope, for easy tape removal). Hethen places the envelopes in one of the large boxes and seals the boxwith the tamper-indicating tape. He next prints the ballots on the 3″×5″cards and covers their printed “vote codes” with the scratch-offstickers. He puts the ballots in the second large box and similarlyseals it.

The software has generated secret “shares” that give the ability tocomplete the election once the shares are input back into a freshversion of the software. Joe can request that the software form theshares so that any majority of shares is enough to complete theelection. Joe can then distribute the shares to people he trusts and askthe software to erase any trace of them. (He could even provide theboxes, or portions of box content in small packages sealed with thetamper-indicating tape, to others for safe-keeping until the ceremony.)The printing should ideally be done without Joe even looking at theprinted information, an aspect that could be corroborated by someoneelse or a video of the printing. Only once the ballots and envelopes aresafely sealed away, the shares safely distributed, and all secretserased by the software, does Joe announce the election and invite peopleto the ceremony.

Joe should invite ceremony participants from various sides of thequestion to be voted on. When Joe and the participants appear at theappointed time and place for the ceremony, they can even flip coins todecide between possible venues to hold the ceremony. The participantsare not only free to record videos or livestream the ceremony but areencouraged to do so.

To start the ceremony, the two boxes, one containing addressed envelopesand the other the ballots, are tossed around to make sure their contentsare mixed up thoroughly (step 1140 a). Then the participants open theboxes and pick out some envelopes and ballots to be “audited.” Joe, withhelp from the software and a majority of those holding shares, posts onthe blockchain only those keys that decrypt the encryptions related tothe audited items (step 1140 b). The participants, and anyone elseduring the online video streaming or later, can check the posted keysonline using open source software and make sure that what Joe originallyencrypted and committed on the blockchain matches the printing that wasaudited.

Some participants can be allowed to pick a few envelopes each (step 1140d), look at the addresses, and then verifiably shred these ballots andenvelopes in front of everyone at the ceremony. (This lets them latercheck with the voters at those addresses to make sure that nobody hascontacted the voters, which could only happen if Joe leaked theaddresses to someone who tried to influence the outcome.)

So-called “decoy” ballots can reduce the effectiveness of vote buyingand the software allows Joe this option. Decoy ballots look like “real”ballots, but a voter receiving one is to be notified (by a separateletter Joe sends) that the ballot will not be counted and that therecipient should ideally try to sell the ballot to help with integrityof the election process, and possibly even to make some extra money.

Should Joe decide to issue decoys, he keeps some of the printed ballotsthat the software indicates are decoys out of the box. After the usualenvelope stuffing at the ceremony, there should be some extra envelopes.Joe then stuffs (1140 c) these leftover envelopes himself, but isallowed peek at and note the addresses. He does this preserving theorder that the decoys were printed in, so he knows which decoy ballotwill be sent which voter. When Joe later supplies this information tothe software, it prepares individual “proofs of decoy” and correspondingaddress labels for each, so Joe can send them out separately. Votersreceiving a proof-of-decoy can look it up online, using the open sourcesoftware, and be certain that the ballot is in fact a decoy; but withoutthis information, the vote buyer will forever be unable to tell it is adecoy.

Decoys can be audited in a similar manner to real ballots (step 1140 e):some participants can be allowed to pick a few decoy ballot envelopeseach, peek at the addresses before verifiably shredding the wholestuffed envelopes in front of everyone at the ceremony. (This lets themlater check with the addressees to make sure Joe sent out the proof ofdecoys.)

Arm holes are cut in the boxes so that participants can reach into theboxes without anyone seeing what is exposed within the boxes.Participants then take turns reaching in through the arm holes andremoving the black tape from each envelope in the box. Participants caneven travel together to some postal collection boxes and deposit theenvelopes directly from the cardboard boxes into the postal boxes. Theyshould never see, or expose to view, any addresses to which a ballot isactually mailed.

Voters follow the instructions on the ballots received, which directthem to one or more voter websites. They visit one and there enter theirballot number and vote code (step 1150) and can even verify that thevalues they provide are posted on the blockchain.

After the date and time Joe originally set for close of polls, which wascommitted on the blockchain, he runs the final step of the software. Onething it does is post lists of votes cast (step 1160), each in aspecific order. The other thing it does is get a hash from theblockchain and post the keys determined by that hash to the blockchain.To do this, the software needs a majority of the shares Joe distributed.The keys posted (step 1170) decrypt the values revealing the tally andallowing it to be audited. Anyone can then use the open source software,or even write their own software, to check (step 1180) the audits andverify the correctness of the tally.

Turning now to FIGS. 11A and 11B, a detailed combination block andschematic diagram of an exemplary multiparty election authority votingsystem is shown. FIG. 11A is the providing of ballots, includingoptionally decoy ballots, to potential voters; FIG. 11B is the voting byvoters and the revealing of results of a corresponding election.

Referring now more specifically to FIG. 11A, three multipartycomputations are shown. Each transforms its inputs in the example fromthe same list, or subsets of the list. For example, transform 1210 usesa first permutation, as indicated by “p1,” and transforms the integerinputs with a key, as indicated by “k1,” into encrypted values deliveredto voters. Each encryption includes a contribution from each of themultiple parties, not shown for clarity, running the election. Eachtransformation in the example also includes mixing, by each of themultiple parties successively, also not shown for clarity.

The operation shown by the box is what may be called a multiparty mixingcascade, as is known in the art, where each node applies a cryptographicoperation (shown as key k1) to each message as well as permutes (shownas permutation p1) the messages. As an example, the mixing withencryption disclosed in the co-pending application, by the sameapplicant, US 2018/0139190 “Precomputed and transactional mixing”published May 17, 2018, which is included hereby by reference herein asif copied here in its entirety, described with reference to FIG. 16A isan example.

Box 1210, in the example, provides vote codes corresponding to votes onethrough five; the vote code is, as will be understood, the encryptionwith k1 of the corresponding vote. Similarly, transform 1220 encryptsand mixes, but it is used in this example to send a second vote code,likely distinct from the first vote code per voter of box 1210, to eachvoter. In the example, for clarity, the five votes are six through ten.For example, the codes of box 1210 can be agreed to mean a “yes” voteand the codes of box 1220 a “no” vote.

Box 1230 is an example of optional decoy ballots. The decoys are shownas a “d” and would not be counted; the real ballots are shown as “r” andare to be counted. A suitable method of delivery would ideally be used.In an electronic messaging environment, the decoy indication (or proofof decoy, which can be sent the same way as or in place of an indicationof decoy, is not shown here for clarity but described elsewhere) it isbelieved should be sent in such a way that a vote-buyer cannot readilyverify if it were sent. One example way to achieve this would be by anunexpected choice of messaging system or even a physical message or mailand/or other out-of-band messaging. Another example way to achieve this,it is believed, uses what is known in the art as “deniableauthentication.” This has message content that the recipient can latersay was different than it actually was. Examples are use of one-time padfor content in an otherwise authenticated message. For clarity, adifferent key, k2, is shown used here.

Referring now to FIG. 11B, exemplary voting and tallying are shown.

Box 1250 takes vote codes supplied by voters and transforms them, usingkey k1 and permutation p2, into corresponding choice of votes, as hasbeen explained. The vote codes supplied are as they were received by thevoters, multiparty encrypted with key k1. Box 1250 permutes or mixesthese encrypted vote codes; box 1250 also decrypts the vote codes usingk1. The result is a set of vote codes. (Which codes are decoys aremarked by the positions input to box 1230 that are “d,” and so the votecode that decrypted to three in the example would be recognized duringtally as a decoy and not counted.) The permutation used to decrypt thevotes in box 1250, p2, is believed to not need to be the same as p1,since the vote decryption results in the input to the vote codes beingrevealed.

Turning now to FIG. 12, a detailed combination flowchart and blockdiagram of an exemplary multiparty election authority voting system isshown.

Box 1310 contains “send multiparty-encrypted vote-codes, through a firstmultiparty permutation, to voters.” It is the delivery, through amultiparty mix, of the vote codes. Each code enters the mix incleartext, but is encrypted further at each stage of the cascade as themessage batch is operated on by each successive node, as will beunderstood. The result is that encrypted inputs, that serve as “votecodes” in this example embodiment, are delivered to voters, but theindividual or partial collusion of the multiple parties performing theoperation learn neither the codes nor which voter receives which codes.

Box 1320 contains “optionally, send multiparty encrypted at least decoyindications, through first multiparty permutation, to voters at leastsomewhat deniably.” It is the delivery, ideally by a means a vote buyerwould not be able to verify the content of, of the indication of decoyand/or the proof of decoy. These two aspects could be delivered togetheror in some examples separately and/or in a multiparty encryption stylethat would have to be combined to be read.

Box 1330 contains “permute, through second multiparty permutation, thevote codes received.” This is the hiding of who submits which vote. Itcan, in some examples, be computed through a mix or other untraceablesending.

Box 1340 contains “reveal election result by multiparty decrypt of codesreceived.” It is the multiparty decryption of the votes. It will beappreciated that boxes 1330 and box 1340 can be combined into a singlemultiparty computation, much as with box 1210 and its description in box1310; however, in some embodiments it is believed that they mayadvantageously be separated as described here.

What is claimed is:
 1. A computerized cryptographic method for at leastone election authority to conduct an election where at least some votersvote remotely and the integrity of the corresponding tally cansubstantially be verified by any interested party, comprising: the atleast one election authority providing ballots to voters; the ballotsincluding vote-codes; receiving from at least one voter at least one ofthe vote-codes; such that the selection of at least which voters receivewhich or any ballots being substantially difficult for the electionauthority to manipulate; and such that at least from some observers atleast something is hidden about which voters receive which ballots orwhich vote codes.
 2. The voting method of claim 1, comprising: at leastone election authority issuing at least one decoy ballot; and the decoyballots being provided by a method selected from the group consistingof: unpredictable, responsive to requests, an auction, andalgorithmically responsive at least to information about voters; and theat least one decoy ballot not contributing a vote in the tally.
 3. Thevoting method of claim 2, wherein at least one of the at least one voterthat a decoy ballot is issued to being supplied a substantial proof thatthe ballot is a decoy.
 4. The method of claim 1, wherein the providingof ballots includes physically combining ballots with hidden vote codeswithin envelopes that are addressed with temporarily hidden addresses.5. The method of claim 2, wherein the providing of ballots includesphysically combining ballots with hidden vote codes within envelopesthat are addressed with temporarily hidden addresses.
 6. The method ofclaim 3, wherein the providing of ballots includes physically combiningballots with hidden vote codes within envelopes that are addressed withtemporarily hidden addresses.
 7. The method of claim 1, wherein theproviding of ballots includes a multiparty mixing of recipients of thevote codes.
 8. The method of claim 2, wherein the providing of ballotsincludes a multiparty mixing of recipients of the vote codes.
 9. Themethod of claim 3, wherein the providing of ballots includes amultiparty mixing of recipients of the vote codes.
 10. The method ofclaim 7, wherein the providing of ballots includes a multipartytransformation of the vote codes.
 11. The method of claim 7, wherein theproviding of ballots includes a mixing of decoy ballots along with realballots.
 12. The method of claim 11, comprising delivering to votersreceiving decoy ballots by deniable encryption an indication of whetherthe ballot is a decoy.
 13. A cryptographic method for conducting anelection in which the integrity of the election tally can be verifiedsubstantially by any interested party, comprising: creating ballot pairsincluding two individual ballots in each pair and a vote code for eachchoice of each individual ballot; commitment to the ballot pairinformation; printing the ballot pairs with indicia consistent with theballot pair information; opening the votes associated with vote codesthat have been voted; opening at least the vote codes of individualballots for which a different vote code was voted; and leaving committedthe votes within the same an individual ballot as a voted code.
 14. Acryptographic method for conducting an election in which the integrityof the election tally can be verified substantially by any interestedparty, comprising: creating ballot pairs including two individualballots in each pair and a vote code for each choice of each individualballot; commitment to the ballot pair information; printing the ballotpairs with indicia consistent with the ballot pair information; openingthe votes associated with vote codes other than those voted; opening thevote codes voted; and leaving committed the votes within the sameindividual ballot as a voted code.
 15. The cryptographic method of claim13, including: opening rows of double ballots not voted.
 16. Thecryptographic method of claim 14, including: opening rows of doubleballots not voted.